Don't forget the cheerleaders of Israeli crimes
Michael Brull
2 Comments
Colin Rubenstein wrote on January 9:
Much attention will surely be focused on the tragic incident at the school in Jabaliya, Gaza, which was caused when Israeli forces responded to Hamas mortars being fired from there.
The UN publicly contradicted this claim, and declared to Haaretz - as noted in a previous blog - that the Israeli army had admitted error. 2 days later, Haaretz reported on an Israeli army investigation into the bombing of a UNRWA school, which decided that the school was bombed by mistake. The Israeli army's new position is that there were rockets being fired 30 meters away, and a stray Israeli mortar struck the school, killing dozens of Palestinians who'd fled there for shelter. So far, I'm not aware of Rubenstein apologising for his previous recitation of Israeli army propaganda, which turned out to be lies. Perhaps Rubenstein will be happy reciting the new lies, without blushing, without embarassment. After all, important people were not at the school - none of the murdered civilians were Jewish.
Of course, Israel repeatedly bombed UN targets. Either Israel's bombing is as indiscriminate as its critics had long claimed, or Israel has specifically been targetting UN installations.
Either way - I think this neatly demonstrates all that needs to be said about Colin Rubenstein and AIJAC.
ONE MORE THING... FOR NOW
At the Age, Yuval Rotem, Israel's ambassador to Australia, criticised the Age for running an op ed by Hamas leader Khalid Meshaal. There is more to be said on this, and hopefully others will do so. For now, I will just say to Mr Rotem, and I hope you read this: how dare you? Who do you think you are? By what write do you think a representative of the Israeli government can instruct Australian media on what they are entitled to publish?
And with what right does a member of a government that has blockaded 1.5 million people, then killed 1200 of them in a few weeks, in response to rockets that killed perhaps 3 Israeli civilians over the course of the "war" (or what Rotem calls a "conflict") - call Hamas a terrorist organisation?
The moral degeneration involved in worshipping Israeli militarism and its outrages is unbelievable. Not only does everything the Israeli army say become axiomatically true. People become dead to the suffering of others. Robert Goot, of ECAJ fame, writes in the Sydney Morning Herald:
We are told more than 1000 Palestinians have died in the latest conflict but it is only rarely mentioned that at least two-thirds of them have been Hamas and other combatants, not civilians.
Put aside Goot's statistics, and be generous towards him. He casually mentions, in a defence of Israel, that it has killed over 300 civilians. This doesn't distress him even slightly. Of course, over 400 children have been murdered by Israel as I write this now. This is in "defence". During this "defence" 3 Israeli civilians were killed. We do not yet know how many Palestinians killed were actually combatants. What we can be sure of is that even if it were 1000 Palestinian children killed - and only children - chauvinists like Goot would praise Israeli restraint as it exercises self defence, by slaughtering the innocent, in the name of progress.
Reader Comments (2)
:)
I looked you up, as promised. I met you today on Clarence Street. I think we should be friends - at least Facebook friends. By the by, I'm breaking my FairfaxNewsMedia boycott to read some of your blog posts. That's a compliment. :)
-Ania
Michael Brull: "Of course, Israel repeatedly bombed UN targets. Either Israel's bombing is as indiscriminate as its critics had long claimed, or Israel has specifically been targetting UN installations"!
• Well, courtesy of the ABC TV foreign corespondent's screening on Feb 10 at 9:30pm, viewers such as myself learned to know about the IDF targeted tank's salvo at Gaza residence of the prominent Palestinian peacemaker. "For many Israeli television viewers, Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish was the disembodied Palestinian voice on their nightly news that brought them first-hand telephone accounts of the fighting in Gaza. Over the past 23-days, the Palestinian doctor had described a harrowing life in Gaza as Israeli air strikes, tanks and artillery repeatedly pounded the isolated Mediterranean strip".
"On Friday night [Jan 16], when Israel's Channel 10 prepared to check in with Abuelaish as hopes for a cease-fire began to become reality, viewers were gripped as a personal tragedy played out live on their evening news. Minutes before Channel 10 went on the air, an Israeli strike had hit the doctor's home in Gaza, killing three of his daughters (a niece also was killed). When an Israeli reporter reached Abuelaish during the newscast, the doctor was frantically trying to save their lives. 'My god, my girls', Abuelaish wailed on the telephone as he pleaded with Israeli journalist Shlomi Eldar for help. 'Shlomi, can't anybody help us'"?
"In what may be remembered as one of the most emotionally-charged events of the devastating 23-day-old Israeli military campaign in Gaza, the Palestinian doctor's family calamity touched a nerve. The Israeli public has been grappling for days with the cloudy ethical questions raised by the strikes on Gaza. Abuelaish made real the abstract moral quandary about fighting adversaries hiding in the densely-populated cities. Channel 10 quickly mobilized. Eldar and his colleagues tapped their Israeli military contacts and helped to spirit Abuelaish, one of his surviving daughters, and other family members into Israel for emergency medical treatment. The injured were taken to the Chaim Sheba Medical Center, where Abuelaish (one of the rare Gaza residents allowed to work in Israel) conducts research".
The story was jarring!
"The Israeli government actively sought to restrict coverage from Gaza as a way to prevent heart-wrenching tales like Abuelaish from overwhelming the reasons behind Israel's campaign to destabilize Hamas. Israel barred reporters from freely entering Gaza during the entire military campaign, and Israeli government officials unapologetically backed the policy: 'There is an unequal war going on there between a power and a terror organization, and the only way to hurt us is to get those images to hurt us in the battlefield of public opinion', Danny Seaman, the head of Israel's Government Press Office, said last week (before the strike on Abuelaish's home). 'In that sense, the less pictures coming out (helping them) the better'. But Abuelaish's story unfolded live on Israel's evening news. And emotions boiled over again on Saturday when Abuelaish spoke to reporters in the hospital".
"Why did they kill them"?
"An inconsolable Abuelaish asked journalists. 'Give me a reason'! The doctor's appeals were too much for Levona Stern (a 55-year-old [stooge], Israeli mother of three boys who had served in the military). As Abuelaish wept, [devious] Stern began angrily shouting at the Palestinian doctor and the reporters gathered around to hear his tale. Without knowing the story, Stern accused Abuelaish of storing weapons in his home (an accusation that has not been made by the Israeli military). 'What's wrong with you, have you all gone crazy'? Stern shouted as people tried to hold her back. 'My son is in the paratroopers, who knows what you had inside your home, nobody is talking about that. 'Nobody is talking'. Who knows what kind of weapons were in your house; so what if he's a doctor? The soldiers knew exactly. They ["terrorists"] had weapons inside the home, you should be ashamed'".